Chapter 5.

Shortly after 5 am, Dean accepted that he was not going to get any sleep. His half-hearted attempts to fall asleep had come to nothing. He was home, but his home no longer felt like home. He was in his room, but it seemed strange and alien and unwelcoming. He had survived Michael's possession, but it had changed him and he didn't know how much or how to change back.

He turned on the light and looked for something to occupy his thoughts. It was too early to call Sarah. He hoped she was sleeping soundly.

She had always said any time, day or night. Maybe it was time to test that. She answered almost immediately. "Dean?" she said.

"Sorry to call you so early." he said, "It's completely unfair."

"Oh, Dean, it's so good to hear your voice." She didn't ask how he was. He knew why. An experienced trauma counsellor, she was allowing him to choose whether to talk about that. It made him uneasy to know how well she already understood how damaged he was by his experiences.

He decided to keep things brief. There was one thing he wanted from her. "I need an honest answer." he said.

"That's all you'll ever get from me." she said.

"I know, but this time, there could be a temptation to lie, to be kind. I don't need lies and false hope. I need to know what you really think. I need the answer to one question, yes or no."

"I think I already know what the question is." she said, "And if I'm right, the answer is yes, you can get back from this."

"You're sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure. It won't be easy and it won't be fast, but you're a natural born survivor and you're already overcoming the effects of your ordeal. I know it feels overwhelming, but you can do this."

Her words held an odd power over him. He had not realised until she spoke how much he had needed to hear them. He wanted to lie on the bed and sob; whether from relief or despair, he didn't know. Not knowing how he was feeling was one of the most worrying things.

"Thanks." he said, knowing she would hear his voice quake a little.

"Dean," she said, "You don't sound like you believe me."

"I want to." he said.

"That's a good start. If you need to come to the farm for a few days again ... "

"No." he said, "Thanks, but Michael ... and there's Cas and Sam and ... But mostly Cas. I should warn you, he could need your support a lot. And he needs me here and he needs me to get over this ... "

"This what?" she said, when the length of the pause made it clear he wouldn't complete the thought.

He hated the fact that even mentioning Cas filled him with revulsion and that revulsion felt like it came directly from Michael's twisted, power-crazed mind. Cas was his friend, but Michael had hated that. Cas was his brother and Michael had made him ashamed of those feelings.

Sarah didn't press him for an answer. She waited while he struggled through the shame and anger and the self-loathing he felt for giving in to both.

"I'm not who I was." he said at last. She didn't speak, so he went on, "He corrupted me. He changed me. Michael did more damage than the mark of Cain. I became a literal demon and I didn't feel so debased and defiled. There's a darkness in me I can't shake off."

"A darkness that hurts Castiel?" she said.

"The things in my head ... I hate Cas. I hate angels."

"You don't hate him." said Sarah.

"Something in me does. When I got home, I should have hugged him. I even hugged Jack and he's a celestial. Cas is somehow worse to the sickness in my head. Michael was sickened by our friendship and now I am too." Tears blurred his vision. "Cas doesn't deserve this." he said.

"That sounds more like love than hate." she said.

"I do love him. You know I do. I know I do. But then, when he's in the same room ... I can't even describe what I feel. I just want to get away from him. Every instinct tells me to put as much distance between us as possible."

"But you're not. You're choosing to stay there."

"Because I have to fix this. I have to get over it. I owe it to him."

"And to yourself." she said.

"I don't matter." he said, automatically, "Forget I said that." he said quickly, "Habit."

"It's a habit I thought we'd begun to challenge." she said.

"I'm sorry." he said, "Michael undid all the good we did. I won't lie to you, Sarah. I'm a mess."

"If he'd undid all we did, you'd lie to me without a second thought. He had weeks to wreak havoc in you, but you've been Dean Winchester for years and you will win. What have you said to Cas?"

"I told him the truth, which was probably wrong." he said, "Cruel."

"It won't have been easy to hear, but you were right to tell him. I think he can understand. He can help you."

"Maybe not." he said, "And under the circumstances, asking him to feels unreasonable. I just wanna be honest with him. I don't wanna lie. I don't expect him to understand. I don't understand."

"I do." she said, "I don't want you blaming yourself for this or thinking it's something you allowed to happen. Nothing that Michael did, to you or anyone else, is your fault. You were a victim."

"And now he's gone, I should stop being one." said Dean, "And I should get back to my life and things should be as they were."

"If anyone else had been through that, you would give them time to heal and recover." she said.

"I'm struggling to see how I can heal from this. I've lost who I was. I've lost the most important friendship I ever had."

"No, you haven't."

"Things were going so well. We had the link. We were talking. I know he sees me back away. I know he hates it."

"Of course he hates it. Your pain will always be painful to him."

"Then there's Sam." he said.

"What about Sam?"

"How bad was it while I was gone?" he said.

"It was a rough time, for all of us."

"Sam said we almost lost Cas."

"Yes, I wouldn't call that an exaggeration."

"How was Sam?"

"Sam was great, holding them all together, always insisting on hope, even when he was afraid you were lost. It was hard for him. Like I said, rough for all of us." There was a pause and then she said, "I knew caring about hunters carried the risk of loss, but I was unprepared for how much losing you like that would hurt. It was like Carl all over again."

The sorrow in her voice touched his heart, but knowing that she cared so much also felt like one of her warm hugs. "I'm sorry." he said, "I know I hurt a lot of people."

"No. Michael hurt us. You saved Sam and Jack. Now, what were you going to say about Sam?"

Dean found himself talking without thinking, rambling on because he was tired and unhappy and desperate to fix the mess he had made. That mess had started a long time ago. "He never wanted this life. I took him from California, bullied him into it, really. He lost Jess. He lost everything. Ended up with me. That seem fair to you?"

"Dean ... "

"Lucifer, Gadreel, Kevin, Charlie, Eileen ... The stuff I put him through. The stuff I did to that kid! I told myself I was protecting him. Great jb I did of that. And now ... "

"Now?" she said.

"It's dumb. It's selfish. It's unfair. I want him to ... Sarah, I never deserved him as a brother."

"What is it you want?" she said.

"Even I can see he's exhausted."

"Dean, please, what were you going to say?" said Sarah.

"I want my brother. I want Sam and only Sam. I wanna get in the Impala with him and just run."

"From what?"

"From everything. But I can't, because people need me. People are relying on me and I have to fix the thing with Cas and Sam cannot take any more weight on his shoulders."

"Maybe you should talk to him as honestly as you talked to Cas." she said.

"I have no right to ask Sam for anything after what I did."

"I think you may find that Sam needs you to ask for something ... anything, because he needs some way to help you." she said.

"I just want things back to normal." he said.